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Wow! I officially stink at keeping up to date with documenting my finished projects. Mexico has come and gone, almost three months ago (!!) and I’ve yet to show off all the pieces I frantically made in the last week before I hit the beach. Since I was too busy reading, swimming, celebrating and getting in as much beach volleyball as possible, I don’t have any photos of the pieces in action… but here are some highlights:

Jaime Christina’s Sunny Day Dress pattern. This was made for the bride, in a gorgeous, (gorgeous!) voile, and it resulted in a lovely draped dress with the perfect amount of swing. Need to make one for myself, next!

For me! Greenstyle’s Lacy Sloped T-shirt, in a tissue weight floral knit. Unfortunately, rookie move – forgot to wash the fabric before I stitched it up… and it will now fit someone’s 5 year old child. Ooops.

The Elise tee, a free pattern from Fine Motor Skills. I have several more of these to take photos of – I love the fit of this shirt and it whips up in under an hour. I leave most hem lines raw, since using a thinner weight fabric means the hem rolls in on itself anyways.

Not handmade, but equally wonderful – a Nine West floppy beach hat I received from a girlfriend for my birthday in February. It got a lot of action, and saved my face!

Your suitcase isn’t complete without some handy zippy bags … right?! I had this fabric in my stash, whipped up a couple of these for the bride to give to her bridesmaids full of little goodies :)

Now I suppose I should get around to making a Bombshell before the summer is over.. and a Cambie, and a Laurel, and…

Another week of Me Made June has commenced. I feel like I’m in the swing of things now, and am still finding it relatively easy to put outfits together. Haven’t had to repeat anything yet! I’m sure I’ll eat my words soon now that I’m tempting fate. That, or my machine will break again!

Today’s item is something I haven’t worn yet this month – self stitched shorts! I haven’t made shorts or pants since high school (who didn’t make pajama pants in Home Ec??), and for some reason pants always tend to scare me. While I’ve stayed away from them so far this challenge, I knew that I’d need to make a few pieces that weren’t skirts/dresses to round out my wardrobe. A co-worker gave me a pattern she had picked up at a garage sale for 25 cents. Nice, I know! Today’s shorts are courtesy of Simplicity 7501 (absolutely OOP), which dates back to 1986. Does that qualify as vintage?? If so, I’ve sewn my first vintage pattern! :) I defintely took the safe route considering this is a Misses/Men’s/Teen boy’s shorts pattern, complete with elastic waist. Ohhhh, yeah. However in their defense, I have seen a LOT of elastic waist skirts, pants, and shorts this season… what’s old is new again.

I rushed with this pattern, and as a result there are a few things that I will be going back and changing. But first,

The Good:
– They fit! They didn’t rip when I sat down, squatted, jumped around, and did a few karate kicks. That’s a plus in my books.
– They’re comfy.
– The fabric I used (midweight cotton broadcloth) cost $2.00!
– They’re navy, which is one of my favorite colors.

The Bad:
– Due to the above-noted rushing, I skipped adding pockets on the sides, which would be nice.
– I attempted to make the waistband lower than called for; as a result I sewed over the rear pockets. Oops!
– I tried to give these a paperbag waist effect; there wasn’t enough fabric to gather so it just looks BAD. I will be going back and making the suggested waistband that is elastic, but lies flat.
– Because I was rushing I didn’t do French seaming on the sides – now when I roll up the legs, you can see the unfinished seams = not cool!

All in all I AM happy with my first attempt at shorts in a decade, so I’m not complaining!